Western appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1885-18??, 1887-07-02
TffEKfcKER.

TIE KICKER.
There IS an oldish gentleman who
goes to his business in a street car
every morning at precisely eight
/ O'Clock. He is known as the .skicker,''
by those who habitually meet him on
the car, because every morning he has
something to kick about, and once he
gets to talking he keeps it up until he
arrives at the corner where he gets off
the car. He has been known to ride a
few blocks farther than his corner, be-
cause he had got to talking on some
subject, and had good istner, and
couldn't find a place in the story to-
break off. The same crowd ale in the
car with the old kicker every morning
composed of a couple of commission
men. coal man, merchant, young
women clerks, etc., and they like to
engage him in conversation, and drop
| off one or two at time, at different
corners, and before he gets to his cor.
ner, and while in the midst of his story,
the last Que leaves him, and he talks to
himself. The other morning he got on
the car and they could all see he was
mad. He jammed himself down in a
corner of the car, put one hand on
the top of the other on the head
of his cane, and looked through
a girl opposite him, at the sky in the
distance, plainly mad enough to bite
nails. A young man who works in a
train dispatcher's Office remarked to
an insurance Office clerk that he noticed
by the morning paper that a new tele-
graph line was being built to Milwau-
kee, from the east. Before the insu-
rance young man could answer, the old
kicker said:
''It's high time there was new
telegraph line. The old telegraph
company is monopoly and nuisance.
Jay Gould ought to be sent to the
penitentiary. kilograms are delayed
unnecessarily, and a man can walk
| faster than telegram goes.''
20, don't know" said the train
dispatcher's young man, .sa telegram
gets here pretty quick. We got a
cable message yesterday in fifteen
minutes from London
''Yes." said the old kicker, as he
jammed his cane down on the Stats Of
the floor, ''and I got one last night
from Wadsworth, forty-two miles
away, in exactly seven hours.''
''How did it happen asked the
Il don't know how it happened that
/ got it SO quick" said the old man,
as he took out a piece of slippery elm
from his pocket and bit off a piece to
| chew. But my son was coming up
from Chicago last night, and he tele-
graphed me from Wadsworth, to send
the carriage to the six o'clock train.
Soon after six he came up to the house
in a hack, with his whole family, six
or seven children, and wanted to know
why didn't send the carriage, and of
course I told him I didn't, know he was
coming. He said he wired me, and I
told him he must have wired me on a
barbed wire fence, by mistake
"Wen, didn'tyou get the message at
allP'' asked girl who clerks in a store
where the old man buys his socks.
80, certainly, got the message"
said he, as he put on his glasses to look
at the girl. "My wife and I retired at
the usual hour. [ sleep on the right
side of the bed, near the burglar alarm,
and my wife sleeps on the left side Of
the bed, near the telephone, about so,"
pointing with his cane to a couple of
Stats on the floor, about in the relative
position that he and his wife were sleep
ing, which caused he girl to blush and
look out the front window at one of the
mules. ave were both sleeping, and
I was dreaming about fire. You see /
had been afraid of fires all day, the wind
blew so hard and had been to the fire at
the brewery that day, so it was no won
der I dreamed Of fire. My wife had
eaten some dandelion green's for supper.
and they Set heavy on her stomach, as
told her they would when she was
eating them, and she said afterwards
she was dreaming Jumbo was walking
up and down on her, though Jumbo is
dead and Barnum has settled with the
railroad company for ten thousand dol
lars, which seems to me to be a small
sum for an elephant that cost so much
as Jumbo did, though Barnum might
have lied about the price he paid for
the elephant"
At this point the Car stopped and
several young girls and the insurance
man got off, and the old man turned to
the train dispatcher's young man and
continued:
= well, all of sudden a bell rang
out clear, and we both woke up, scared.
My wife thought it was the burglar
alarm, and she tried to climb over me
to get to the indicator to see what part
of the house the burglar was trying to
get in. You see we have had that
burglar alarm set for seven years, every
night, and it has never rung, and it
was no wonder my wife was anxious to
find out where the burglar was. She
felt as though our long and patient
waiting for a burglar was about to be
rewarded, and that we were going to
realize on our outlay for the burglar
alarm, so she was climbing over me,
when concluded it was the telephone
bell, and | was going to climb out on
her side, and we collided. She went
out over the foot board and struck her
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